


Strays

by TsarinaTorment



Series: International Rescue & Relief [19]
Category: Thunderbirds
Genre: Character Study, Friendship, Gen, John and Parker have Things In Common, irrelief, the law is more of a guideline
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-06-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:48:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24588595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TsarinaTorment/pseuds/TsarinaTorment
Summary: Her ladyship collects strays.
Relationships: Aloysius Parker & John Tracy, Lady Penelope Creighton Ward & John Tracy
Series: International Rescue & Relief [19]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1671880
Comments: 3
Kudos: 20





	Strays

**Author's Note:**

  * For [eos-in-orbit](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=eos-in-orbit).



> A fanfiction written for #irrelief, using eos-in-orbit's prompt “John and Penny being close friends (bonus if there’s a suspicious Gordon in the background)”

His errant ward had quite the knack for picking up strays. Not that one Aloysius Parker could really talk when he himself was a ‘stray’ collected by her father, but it appeared that this was a case of like father, like daughter.

At least Lady Penelope had yet to pick up any former criminals amongst her collection, although Parker suspected she counted him despite not being the one to gather him herself. A gifted stray from her father, perhaps. That being said, one of her strays was the sort that Parker thought would do very nicely in the underground, if given half a chance.

He hadn’t taught the boy any more of his tricks than he had his ward – or the boy’s brothers, because they were all so, _so_ eager and maybe he liked the rapt attention from all of them, no matter what their father had to say about them learning to pick locks and pockets whenever he met them – but he sat and watched as a certain redheaded Tracy made his own choices about the law, and whether or not the law should be followed.

Back when he’d first met John Tracy, a gangly beanpole of a teenager attending language classes with her Ladyship and finding himself added to her collection of strays – not her first, but in Parker’s opinion, by far the best (and not just because he didn’t even give the beautiful young woman a second glance; Parker might not be her _father_ but that didn’t stop him feeling the urge to chase away any and all potential suitors until she was old and grey herself) – he hadn’t thought much of it. One more stray. One more charity case to be added to her posse of _connections_.

But Master Tracy wasn’t any old stray, it transpired. While her Ladyship kept in contact with all of her strays, it was the awkward redhead who shied away from contact and stayed far, far away from any social events he could possibly avoid that stayed.

That was when Parker started to take notice, and saw what his ward had probably seen all along.

Master Tracy had looked at the laws of the world, and their variations from country to country, where the World Government’s reach was greater or lesser, and much like Parker himself, a young whippersnapper in the streets of London, had found them wanting.

Laws were simply… _guidelines_. Almost two generations apart, from different sides of the great Pond some called the Atlantic, Parker saw his mirror.

He’d wondered what Mr Tracy had been thinking, after he’d been brought in on the secret that was International Rescue, giving his second eldest son a space station with the capabilities to hack into anything and everything. Did Colonel Jeff Tracy, world famous astronaut and billionaire businessman to boot, know what he’d done? Up in space, cut off from the world and with a super computer at his disposal, the young Master Tracy who hacked into his lecturer’s computers for more work to do, or the library when there was a book out of his access, had the power to do anything.

And no-one could stop him.

Oh, Master Tracy was careful, of course. Not once did Parker ever hear him refer to what he was doing as _hacking_. “I’ve obtained access” was a favourite phrase of his, and Parker was never sure how many people could hear what he was really saying: _I hacked my way in_. Maybe they’d question more if it wasn’t to save lives.

He’d learnt that wording from her Ladyship. Americans didn’t do finesse like the British, talking without saying, silence and omissions speaking louder than the words that spilled from their lips. That much was obvious from the redhead’s brothers – if there was one brother that knew Master Tracy’s methods weren’t legal, it was the eldest, the “John, can you hack this” leader of the pack. No, no subtlety at all.

It could be said that her Ladyship had obtained herself six strays from that family – five brothers and a sister who had been hurt by the world but refused to hurt it back. Parker disagreed. Friends, perhaps, as much as Lady Creighton-Ward could permit herself to have _friends_ , rather than associates and acquaintances, but there was only one stray to have wormed his way into her affections.

Parker wasn’t the only one that knew this. Amber eyes narrowed in jealousy whenever his older brother was earthside and in the comfort of FAB1. Younger, louder, brasher, _American_. He saw it – saw the way Master Tracy no longer shied away from her Ladyship’s touches and let himself be led into his own personal lion’s den over and over again. He watched, and knew that he’d never have that relationship with her.

Or anything of the sort, if Parker had anything to do with it. Master Tracy had proven himself time and time again to be no threat to his paternal instincts, but the younger Master Tracy had _threat_ oozing from every pore. Not on Parker’s watch.

Let it not be said that he disliked Gordon Tracy. All of the Tracys, including the elder, wiser generations, were perfectly fine people and Parker had shown them all too many tricks from his misspent youth for them to be anything other than friends – Parker was not a Lady, Parker could have as many friends as he wanted. He was just a caretaker, second father, and it would be remiss of him to allow Lord Creighton-Ward’s greatest treasure to slip carelessly through his fingers into a world that she would always be too young for, in the eyes of her guardians.

Master Tracy – _John_ Tracy, it got confusing when there was more than one of them around, and at some point Parker switched to calling him Master John, just to make it easier – was by no means her Ladyship’s first stray, but he was the one that Parker approved of the most. For a Lady, the law was rigid, harsh and unmoving. She had to follow it to the letter, even when it didn’t suit her purposes.

For Parker and Master John, the law was flexible, _guidelines_ , rather than a shackle. When they were on the case, the law _always_ suited their purposes. Maybe they’d been collected for that exact reason, but Parker was happy to serve, and he knew Master John well enough to know he felt just the same.

**Author's Note:**

> IRRelief is still going! For those that don't know, it's a collection of prompts organised by Gumnut that anyone can add to and use on tumblr, with a focus on fluff, to give us something to do while we're stuck indoors. [Full details are here](https://nutty.gumnut.net/irrelief/)


End file.
